


People Let Me Tell You 'Bout My Best Friend

by mcgarrygirl78



Series: Thicker than Water [82]
Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Family, Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-03
Updated: 2013-02-03
Packaged: 2017-11-28 00:54:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/668419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcgarrygirl78/pseuds/mcgarrygirl78
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“How the hell can you fail better?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	People Let Me Tell You 'Bout My Best Friend

**Author's Note:**

> This story is told in the Thicker than Water universe where the BAU are kids and teens.

_So wild, standing there, with her hands in her hair_  
I can't help remember just where she touched me  
There's still no face here in her place  
So cool, she was like jazz on a summer's day  
Music, high and sweet, then she just blew away…

“What if she says no?” he stopped singing Steve Winwood long enough to ask the question.

“If she doesn’t already have a date she isn’t going to say no.”

“Is this some psychic girl thing that I'm not aware of?”

“Yes Coop, I'm a psychic and have been hiding it from you all this time.”

“Your tone indicates that you're messing with me.”

“Good,” Emily laughed. “Because I am.”

“I'm serious though Emily, I like this girl.”

“You're winning my argument for me.”

“I don't think she's interested. We’ve been out a few times, it was fun, but something’s missing.”

“Like what? Tell me what you expect and what you're not getting.”

“She just doesn’t seem interested in me.” he sounded disappointed but also as if this was just the same disappointment, different day.

“Well if she were interested in you, as you see it, what would she be doing now that she isn’t? And you better not say anything sexual or I'm going to belt you one.”

“I'm almost 18 years old. Almost everything I think about is sexual. The other things involve sports or fake cheese products.”

“You are so…”

“Hey Emily I…” Jason walked into the room. “Oh hey Coop; I didn’t know you were here.”

“What's happening, Jason.” Coop waved from across the room where he was hanging upside down in Emily’s chair. His long jean-clad legs nearly reached up to her framed _Rebecca_ poster.

“Coop came over to hang out and lament on his girl troubles. Tell him Jason; tell him that he's awesome and anyone would love to go out with him.”

“Well um…” Jason looked at his girlfriend and then he looked at Coop. “Um…”

“Don’t hurt yourself Gideon, I get it. You’ve never been my biggest fan but it’s OK, for real.”

“It’s not that Coop, I just…”

“Jason likes you Coop, I don’t know how many times I have to tell you. He’s not boisterous like me but if he didn’t like you then you would know. You guys should go out and do something fun together.”

“Seriously?” Coop raised his eyebrow.

“Yes, I'm being serious. Go out and bowl or see a movie or hit Pizza Pete’s. I bet you would have fun together. I'm not saying right at this moment but it’s something to think about for the future. You can grab Hotch…make it a threesome.”

“Bad choice of words Prentiss.” 

“I concur.” Jason smirked.

“See, Jason agrees that it’s a bad idea.”

“No, I was agreeing on the bad choice of words. It’s not a horrible idea but you're Emily’s friend, not mine. That doesn’t mean I hate you but I don’t think we have a lot of things in common.”

“I'm OK with that. I still like you.”

“Thank you Coop.” he smiled.

“And Andi Swann likes you.” Emily said. “Call her right now. Ask her to a movie or something and then when you go out ask her to the prom. You're going to wait too long and she’s going to have a date, just like winter formal. Do you know how lucky you are that Keri Derzmond broke up with her boyfriend and was available to go?”

“You call sitting all night and having to hear about Ryan this and Ryan that lucky? We are clearly not from the same planet Prentiss. They got back together like 3 days later and now they both give me the evil eye.”

“Andi didn’t look to happy with her date. You both looked happy when you danced together.”

“It was nice.” Coop said. “I could call her.”

“Don’t hurt yourself.” Emily stuck out her tongue.

“I feel like I'm interrupting something.” Jason said. 

As hard as he tried, and he did try, Emily having a male best friend was tough on him. He wasn’t the jealous type. At least he wasn’t outwardly. But he had to be inwardly because sometimes he was even jealous of Hotch’s relationship with Emily. Hotch was his best friend. Coop never got all the concessions that Hotch did. Maybe Jason needed to try harder.

“What's up Jace?” she asked, poking her head out of the closet.

“What are you doing?” he asked her.

“I've been asking her that for an hour, man.” Coop said.

“I'm getting clothes ready for the week. Part of making my life less stressful is not worrying about what I'm going to wear everyday. I hate to say it but I miss school uniforms.”

“Bite your tongue.” Coop said. “Even with all the rules I still love seeing the girls walking down the hall with their different styles. Did you see Andi in her vintage _Days of Our Lives_ tee shirt last week.”

“You are adorably hopeless Eric Cooper.”

“I was just popping in to see if you wanted a say on dinner tonight.” Jason said. “I was thinking about not ordering out but cooking. There's lots of good food downstairs and we had pizza last night.”

“Cooking sounds great. We could make some fries and chop up some of the chicken breasts. Then we could use a bunch of different sauces like barbecue and the buffalo stuff Morgan likes and honey mustard…the kids would love that.”

“I'm hungry already.” Coop said smiling.

“You're going to stay for dinner Coop?” Jason asked.

“That would be cool; I don’t have plans or anything. Only if it’s not going to be an inconvenience. There's a frozen pizza and something sports-related with my name written all over it at home if need be.”

“No, it’s not an inconvenience. We always make room for friends at our table.”

When Jason looked back at his girlfriend, Emily just smiled. She didn’t know why Jason couldn’t quite get along with Coop. She didn’t think he really knew either. But his trying always made her happy. Emily loved Coop but as a best friend, not as anything more. Somewhere in the secure part of his brain, Jason knew Coop felt the same way. It wasn’t always easy to be secure at 19.

“I’ll go and thaw out the chicken. It should be ready to cook in about an hour.”

“That sounds good to me.”

“OK. Um…OK.”

Jason walked out of the room and Coop finally sat up in the chair.

“He wanted to kiss you goodbye but felt weird cuz I was staring.” He said.

“If you don’t call Andi then I'm not speaking to you anymore.” She said.

“I don’t want to be rejected Prentiss. Despite my outward appearance of awesome, my ego can be fragile sometimes.”

“But you’ll never know if you don’t try. Think about Zoë. She’s always been shy around guys and never thought she was as pretty as her friends. But then she got up the confidence, took the risk, and she met a great guy. It doesn’t always work but if you fail, try again, fail again, fail better.”

“How the hell can you fail better?” Coop asked.

“It’s a Samuel Beckett quote.” Emily said.

“Well I don’t like him at all. He has no idea what he’s talking about.” He bounded out of the chair and went to sit on her bed. “OK, I'm gonna do it. Tell me I'm not gonna make an ass of myself.”

“You're not going to make an ass of yourself. Should I leave you alone to do your thing?”

“Well…”

“It’s OK.” She smiled. “I have to use the bathroom anyway. You’re going to be fine.”

Emily went into the bathroom and closed the door as Coop picked up the phone. After she was done with that she went to check on Penelope and JJ. Penelope was alone in the room, playing on her bed with one of her Supermodel Stacy dolls and her rats, Alexander the Great and Pepper. Pepper was relatively new and replaced the dearly departed Tito. 

“JJ would freak out if she knew the boys were out of their cage but not in their ball.” Emily said.

“I break the rules all the time when she isn’t here. She should be back from Will’s in about a half hour. Is Coop still here?”

“Yeah. I'm giving him a little privacy to make a phone call.”

“Is he calling a girl?” Penelope asked.

“Yes.” Emily sat down on the bed, picking up Pepper and playing with him. She enjoyed the rats. She and Penelope were really the only ones.

“I don’t get why he doesn’t have like a million girls chasing him. He’s really cute and he’s fun and funny and awesome. You know?”

“I totally know, Penelope.” Emily nodded.

“I hope it works out for him.”

“Me too. I better get back in there and make sure all is well.” she stood from the bed, cuddled Pepper, and put him back down. “Get the guys back in their cage before JJ gets back.”

“I will; I promise.” Penelope smiled as her big sister walked out of the room.

When she walked back into her room Coop was already off the phone. He was fiddling with her radio so she rushed over to slap his hands.

“No way! I'm not listening to Limp Bizkit or any of that mess.”

“Hey, I listen to cheesy 80s love songs and emo stuff cuz we’re friends. Cut me a break, Prentiss.”

“No.” she shook her head. “What happened with Andi?”

“We’re gonna go out and get some food Tuesday after school.” Coop shrugged. “No biggie.”

“No biggie? Sometimes I hate you.”

“Nah, you don’t. I'm glad she said yes. Its probably gonna be the dumbest thing I've ever done but I think I’ll just lay it all out. If she doesn’t like me then I'm not gonna keep making a fool of myself. Better to know now.”

“I hope you get what you're looking for.”

“I think you just wanna be right.” Coop nudged her.

“I'm always right.” Emily grinned.

“Mmm hmm, I know.”

“I'm so glad you're my best friend.” She threw her arms around him and laughed.

“Oh my God, are we about to have a moment or something?” he made a face.

“Eric Cooper, get out of my room.”

“Are you serious?”

“I'm so serious. Go downstairs, I'm sure the boys are watching something good on TV you can get into. I need to coordinate these outfits and then we’ll get dinner ready. Go on; I should be down in about 20 minutes or so.”

“I know from experience with my mother Emily…it’s the ‘or so’ part that scares me.”

She smiled and he did too. Then Coop went downstairs to make time go by with Emily’s family until she came down to have some fun too. He could probably be doing plenty on a Saturday night; the world was an 18 year old’s oyster. But Emily’s house was always a good time. He’d had friends before, in New York he was teetering on the edge of the popular kid cliff. Here though, in a town that he didn’t even want to move to, Coop found his own version of family.

***


End file.
